As a snack of what was going to happen, the bad news came during the night of the previous day. A painful blow that did not pass from Coscorrón, since the ascent to Coll de Pradell had been canceled, at the Berga to Queralt stage, the penultimate of the contest. The wind, explained and according to the recommendations of the Catalan Traffic Service, made it unfeasible to roll through the mountain, a danger to the runners. But there were three more ports, so the queen stage was stood, although a little faded. Lasted little; What took dawn. Aggressive storm, general uncertainty, infinite chaos and gallop solution that ended up converting the stage, after entanglements and entters, after debates and probatures, in a 25 -kilometer race. It was the desire of the cyclists (of some), Ento for competing in those circumstances. It was a sprint length without changes in the general. One who took Quinn Simmons, Republican North American and Donald Trump, long hair and panocha as well as his mustache, very much in the style of a Harley-Davidson motorist.
He whipped a tremendous gale through the Berga industry walk in a good morning, to the point that several business umbrellas and considerable size flew or even departed in two. The thousands of fans who approached to see the protagonists, mass bath that explains the fans of the earth to the two wheels and the handlebar, protected with hoods, after cars or trees, and kept the smile. And although the teams of the teams took to appear, the countenance was very different in sports directors, also in the runners. It turns out that they had learned from the social networks that perhaps also annulled the last ascent, from four to two mountains. Moments of nerves and doubts, of changes in the career strategy. It happened, however, that everyone fell short. “In the end we have had to raise an alternative route, a circuit of about 60 kilometers that will be covered twice,” Rubén Peris, the director of the Volta, resolved busy between calls and reproaches, between consultations and decisions; “But no mountain will be done because the wind …” Reina A stage and was still worse; And it almost didn’t happen or that.
For a quarter of an hour, cyclists waited sitting on their bikes to the departure gun, many reluctant to participate in a race they considered unnecessary. But the decision, reconciled between the address of the contest, the commissioners of the race and the police, had already been taken. Although, of course, it did not rain for all the same, since there were teams, such as the ineos or the visma ——, which preferred not to roll, worried about a cap that came out expensive. He even threatened with an approach, discarded after Peris spoke with a small representative cast of the cyclists. And it ended up taking a Solomonic resolution, a first neutralized round – without attacks, only to test – and a second competition if it was tert. A whole slap for the UAE and the Bora, the squads of, wishes of the mountains and of exhibiting muscle because the last day, on the repes of Montjuïc, does not usually give for many successful attacks.
“If there had been ports, well because Juan is in a perfect state, but now it is about sprints and bonuses, ”said Joxean Matxín, sports director of the UAE.“ It is not ideal because you came with expectations and ”, his Bora’s counterpart, Patxi Vila, joined;“ it was an important stage for the race, which now stays a little decaffeinated, and also for the future, because it was the best preparation for the turn ”. Although they both understood the resolution to suppress the ports.“ We have been looking at the applications. forecasts, above in the ports there are gusts of more than 100 km/h. It is an unnecessary risk because with that wind, a corridor is not that he falls to the ground, but that it flies, “Matxín interceded.” They are things that cannot be controlled and you have to adapt, “Vila accepted;” But, so, regardless of who wins, the strongest will not do it. “
Simmons did in Berga. But at times he doubted to run. Until Roglic, as a squad spokesman and before finishing the first round of the circuit, approached the commissioner’s car and resolved it with a: “Everything is fine.” Then they were Marc Soler (UAE) and Juanpe López (Lidl-Trek) to ask for competing earlier than agreed, to avoid making the second round to the tour and arrive very late to the hotels in Barcelona, since the rhythm until that moment, since they were in neutralized race, it was Chirigota. Petition that reluctantly accepted the commission and encrypted the stage in 25 kilometers to resolve it to the sprint Final, without bonuses or anything, which completely prevented the new chapter of the Ayuso-Roglic duel. “I’m a bit in shock for the changes. I did not want to play in a volta like that, but they are the circumstances that have touched us and the changes are understandable seeing the wind that makes, ”he said that some did wanted to run the established.“ Some cyclists have not complied with the established. At first they did not want to run and then, in what is a disrespect, they have decided that the stage will end before, ”protested director Peris.
In the perhaps shorter race in history, Verona (Lidl-Trek) and Van Den Broek (Picnic) opened a small hole, aspiration of power two against all, a pulse of David against Goliath. They did not get yours, absorbed in the absence of 10 kilometers. And, certificate that there would be no change in the classification – bombing that everyone arrived inside the squad five kilometers from the finish line – many cyclists were picking up. Everything was reduced to sprint. Either that, since in the last ramp, at about one kilometer, Simmons stood up on the bicycle and ripped furiously, taking off even from his shadow, a huge hole that no one could deny, no matter how much he did not have a second one in the goal. His was the glory on a day of sad and chaotic cycling, in a stage that was asked to be the queen and that ended, because of the wind, for being a joke.
